Essex Review
Extract from No. 130. Volume
XXXIII (April 1924)
Some Essex Royalist Clergy –
and Others
By the Rev Harold Smith DD
There is a long letter from
Simon Lynch, the third of the name. (MSS, J Walker. C.I.27.) He speaks first of his grandfather, Simon
Lynch, of North Weald, included in Fuller’s Worthies. ‘My grandfather Mr Simon
Lynch, was presented to the vicarage of North Weale two miles beyond Epping in
Essex by Bishop Elmer, then Bishop of London, his relation, giving him strict
charge of feeding his lambs till he could make better provision for him; which
afterwards he frequently would have proffered him, but he as often replied, His
lambs were not yet become sheep; tho’ he lived to bury ye parish 3 times over,
being near of a 100 years of age, which is noted and quoted with other
observations and remarks at the beginning of the first part of Fuller’s
Worthies. Now I’ll give you an account
of his son, Mr Simon Lynch, Rector of Runwell in the same county, within 5
miles of Ingatestone and Billericay, who was sequestered from his benefice
worth £140 per Annum in his days, for not complying with the barbarity,
unnaturalness and inhumanity of the wicked in wicked times; [he] accepted the
curacy of Blackmore from the worshippfull Major Smith, who was patron and
parson, it being an impropriation, never before allowed but £20 per annum;
notwithstanding his persecutions, prosecutions for being in the King’s service
at Colchester leaguer, and for which being often in prison and decimated, yet
this worthy gentleman allowed to my father £30 per annum, being a sufferer with
him; who then rode every Sunday from North Weale, his father’s house, where he
sojourned to Blackmore to supply his cure and officiate, which was seven miles
and as bad a read as a man could ride, and in all weathers for some years,
resolving by the assistance of God Almighty to omit no part of his duty since
he was cald to ye ministry, but would minister God’s Word not for profit but
for conscience sake; for whilst he there officiated he was proffered a benefice
in Norfolk of £400 per annum, and courted for acceptance, which he yett refused
rather than comply with the profligated wretches in their dismall and fatall
times of oppression; and all the time of his sequestration one Greene, a broken
puritanical shop-keeper, enjoyed his living, my Father no ways seemingly to
make godliness his gaine, for his expressions quotidie were. If it pleased Almighty God to spare his life
to see King Charles ye 2 restored to his kingdom, he should not care how soon
after his dissolution was to make resignation of his soule to ye great God yt
gave it; who lived to see yt happy day, and just as he was going to receive and
take possession of his parsonage he made his exit.’
The letter goes on to speak of
his will, which contains a copy of the inscription ‘he ordered to be put up on
a marble tombstone, which was effected when he was interred at Blackmore,
declaring his persecutions by Gog and Magog.’
Notes. (1) The precise date
and grounds of Lynch’s sequestration from Runwell do not appear; probably
1644. His appointment to Blackmore seems
to date March 1646/47, as he was then referred to the Westminster Assemble for
it. (MS. Bod. 324,f,190.) He was even
granted £50 yearly augmentation; he complained in October that he had not
received that sum due last Lady Day. The
Committee ordered it to be paid. (MS. Bod. 325,f.84.) But it is doubtful how much of this Lynch
ever had; if his previous sequestration were brought up it would probably be
stopped, especially as his patron was concerned in the Second Civil War. At all events it appears in no subsequent notice
or list. The Inquisition of 1650 was not
favourable to him. ‘Simon Lynce, Clerk, supplyeth the Cure by the appointment
of the said Stephen Smith, Esq., who payes him for his paynes thirtye poundes
per Ann. The said Simon Lynce, Clerk,
was putt out of Runwell for his scandalous life, and brought into this parish
without the consent of the well affected inhabitants.’
(2) The value of Runwell is given at the
Inquisition as Glebe £10. Tithe £65. (The estimates at the Inquisition are
generally ‘conservative’). The
‘Intruders’ were (a) Nehemiah Long, who had much dispute with Mrs Lynch about
her ‘fifth part’. About 1647 he went to
Matching, and was afterwards at Dengie and Steeple. (b) ‘Mr Oakley’ was there in 1650; he paid
£12 yearly to Lynch. (c) Nicholas Greene, appointed March 1655/56. He was ejected 1660, but was apparently vicar
of East Hanningfield, 1663-1669.
